I WANT CORALINE!!!!!!! need advice on how to make it grow

[philly]

i have a 90 gal.

i wanna get coraline growing
ive been supllementing calcium for a month

i have a little bit on some rock i got but it aint spreadin

how do i incourage coraline growth

 

[Corty]

WWM seems to have several pages of good information, you can find it here: http://www.wetwebmedia.com/corallinealg.htm

Look up at the top for more links, there is a lot of ground covered.

 

[William]

You've neglected to mention how much, and what type, of lighting you have.

Coraline grows extremely slow under very low light. So if you have low light, thats probably your problem.

and the only way to speed it up, is to buy a stronger, more intense light. however, remember you can't just switch these out, you have to aclimate your tank to the new lighting.

I believe there is an article on that around here somewhere.

 

[BillyZ]

stronger light will help. Also light more towards the blue spectrum has been preported to help. You've been suplimenting calcium, but do you need to? What are you current CA levels? Dosing without testing can lead to very bad results!

 

[Bang Guy]

In my experience Coralline grows a LOT faster in low light.

Balanced Calcium and Alkalinity levels seem to be the ticket as well as a very low Phosphate level.

 

[Atari]

I think there are different types that will thrive in different lighting conditions.. but as Bang Guy mentioned they all need balanced ca/alk and low phosphate.

It also helps to scrape some off and let a powerhead disperse it around the tank.

The last ingredient is patience. One month is nothing...

 

[Bang Guy]

I think there are different types that will thrive in different lighting conditions..

Yup. I agree.

 

[seaham358]

I agree with bang guy on this also. My 55 fowlr with a NO strip light with 80 watts of NO grew faster then my 125 with 4x110 vho.
And as they say you need a balance.... I run my cal at 400-450 and alk around 10.6. you need to test just about every day at first to make sure your adding enough additives till you get the balance.....

 

[MT79]

Step one is to buy ca/alk test kits if you haven't already. To get the ca/alk balanced I really like B-ionic. Everything in my tank looked better after I started using it, including the coralline. And as Atari said "one month is nothing"...patience. Here is a good link about ca/alk balance http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/nov2002/chem.htm

 

[XXFirefighter]

Look for stuff called Blackpowder...
and Spectra Blend.. heard it makes it grow like mad.. I'll be trying it here soon in my nano

 

[Bang Guy]

I strongly caution against adding products with no ingredient list...

 

[mojoreef]

Once your levels of calcium and alkalinity the best way I know of to encourage corraline growth is with the use of an urchin. The urchin will go through the tank eating the corraline, this will cause the corraline to spore, when the urchin poops, all the spores will spread through out the tank and begin new colonies.

take care


Mike